A good move by the PCB

After months of uncertainty, the Pakistan Cricket Board(PCB) announced conditional support for International Cricket Council’s (ICC) reforms on governance of the game. In other words the Big Three plan with its amended resolutions is now backed by all full members of the governing body of the game and Pakistan seems to have finally decided to jump on the bandwagon; and just as well. Chairman Najam Sethi outlined on April 11 the gains that Pakistan made in the two-day Executive Board meeting in Dubai and appears hopeful of earning Rs30 billion for the board over the next eight years. The most significant development during the Dubai meeting was the assurance given by the Indian Board Secretary on arranging bilateral series. A series with India remains lucrative for all cricket boards, including Pakistan and even on a neutral venue, the famed Indo-Pakistan rivalry is set to earn a major chunk of the Rs30 billion target envisaged by the board.

Hence, Pakistan cricket stands to at least benefit from a proposal that it had no power to stop. The board has signed agreements with several of its foreign counterparts on staging home series with Pakistan on a neutral venue or in their own cricket stadiums once the security situation improves. As Sethi pointed out, if we don’t have any home tours we don’t earn any money, and this money is needed to run the affairs of domestic cricket. Most of the boards were also convinced by Sethi and Co. on keeping the option to tour Pakistan open. Pakistan is also now set to have its own president after the tenure of Alan Isaac ends, which is heartening.

Indeed, Pakistan now seems to be working hard to take the best of what, at first glance, did not appear to be the ideal situation to improve cricket in the country. If such efforts continue and are realised wholeheartedly, we may yet see better days for the sport and for Pakistani cricket fans who have been deprived of live cricketing action at home, considering Pakistan has not hosted any international cricket since the attack on the Sri Lankan team five years ago.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 13^th, 2014.

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